If you use the method of joining blocks as in quilt as you go no need to put whole quilt order until the borders.
Methods is showing quilts done this way on angie quilts ,one lady manages and has very poor shoulders.
The big quilts are usually done in 4 sections, I did a wedding ring in 9 sections. You can put sashing to join or just join straight edges . Imusuallydo a quilt over seam just to keep in pattern.

I do large quilts on my small machine all the time. Right now i am doing Baptist Fans on a quilt. First I make a sandwich on the left hand side of the quilt, leaving just the top and backing on the rest of the quilt which is easier to push through the harp. I quilt the sandwhiched side then sandwich the next third of the quilt(the middle) sewing the batting edges together and then pinning the sandwich smooth and proceed to quilt that. Finally I do the same to the righthand side of the quilt and voila! all done! A lot of work, but worth it. AND I do all this handling of cloth and batting sitting down as i'm unable to stand. Try that sometime!

Quilting queen size

I quilt in three sections on queen size quilts. Then I sew the sections together and it works nicely. Also, I have l quilted squares as you go and then sewn the completed blocks together using my 1952 Featherweight - just love her.

When I first started quilting, I did what is sometimes called lapquilting, doing the piecing/appliqueing of the block (20 inches or so with sashing) and then sandwiching and backing it and quilting it before sewing the blocks together (by machine on top and by hand on back) -- this method worked well and was easy to do on the machine -- as an alternative, strips of blocks could be done the same way -- I have seen other methods of quilting shown here on QB -- good luck as it seems that nothing is really easy and each method has drawbacks --

I was considering doing the king size D9P this way and this thread may have given me the courage to give it a try. I have already sewn my blocks together in rows so I could quilt each row as I go. But I plan on putting a small maybe 3 or 4 inches border on. When do you think that should be added? Thanks for the help.

I have done a few queen quilts on my home machine and it was a bit of a challenge, but very doable. I wouldn't hesitate to do it again. But here are two sites to check out. The first is Diane Gaudynski's site. She is a master quilter who does all her award winning (and stunningly beautiful) work on her domestic machine. She gives lots of tips, hints and suggestions for getting great results. The second site is Leah Day's site. She mostly does smaller quilts, but she also has great ideas for quilting on a domestic machine.

I have done a great many, (at least 100) but can't anymore due to shoulder and back arthritis. I expect to get friends to LA for me or use QAG in the future. The trick with doing these on a home machine is to pin baste well, then just do one little piece at a time before going to the next.

Getting my quilts long arm quilted is getting too dang expensive. I'm debating whether to try to quilt my queen sized quilt on my small janome machine. The largest I've done so far is a twin. It turned out pretty good...not error free, but for the most part it turned out acceptable.

So do any of you quilt your large quilts at home on your small machines? I need to hear that it can be done. I'm really nervous to start a large quilt.

Gayle

I quilt on my Singer 500 husband made the leaf for my dinning room table.